A spokesperson for Bord Gáis has said the company has set up around 23,000 payment plans for gas and electricity customers who are in arrears from January to September of this year.
The spokesperson said that worked out at between 2,000 and 3,000 people every month.
He also said that there had been a slight decrease in disconnections over the last year and a half. He added that disconnections only happen as a last resort.
A customer who gets into arrears will be offered a payment plan. They may also be asked to agree to having a pre-payment meter for gas installed in their home.
If they refuse these options, they face the possibility of being disconnected if they can not pay their bills.
The company's chief executive John Mullins said this was a real issue and that a big social recession was occurring.
Mr Mullins said this recession was affecting a different type of customer than in the 1970s and 1980s. Mortgage holders were especially being hard hit, he added.
He said, however, that Bord Gáis can not have the 'good' customers paying for the 'bad' and therefore disconnections were possible. He added, though, that the company was trying everything in its power to ensure that would not happen.
The Bord Gáis CEO was speaking to journalists at the new Whitegate generation plant in Cork, which is due to be one of the most efficient in the country.
He said this would allow the company to maintain discounts of between 10 and 14% for customers into next year.
90,000 ESB customers in payment plans
The ESB has said 90,000 of its customers have entered into payment plans since the beginning of this year, after experiencing difficultly paying their bills.
The company anticipates that it will incur €20m in bad debts as a result of the arrears - twice the level of 2009. A ESB spokesman said disconnecting customers would be done only as a last resort.
He encouraged anyone experiencing difficulty, or anticipating that they might, to ring the ESB and an affordable plan of repayment would be worked out.
